Rememberance
by K. A. Maples
Summary: A short MerlaLotor fic I wrote. Mostly Merla looking back on her time with Lotor.
1. Rememberance

Merla sat in front of the mirror, bright pink hair in her hands as she stared at her reflection. She scowled at the little lines developing between her eyebrows and at the corners of her mouth. Too much scowling, too much hard work. Her mother would have said that her beauty had grown character. Six years ago, Merla would have said she was turning into an old hag. Now... now she was just glad she could look at her face in the mirror at night.  
  
The war had not been good to her... but it had been far worse to Lotor. She closed her eyes. It had taken her years to forgive her former husband for everything he had done to her. It had never been anything physical... but it was just amazing the kind of damage emotions could do to a person. And Lotor had been amazingly good at manipulating her emotions.  
  
She still remembered those last few days before her prince's death quite vividly. She still remembered how he had torn apart his chambers as report after report had come in, telling of endless defeats at the hands of the Alliance. Meanwhile, the citizens of Doom had rioted outside the castle, demanding access to the stores of food within.  
  
Looking back now, Merla could see that Lotor had been doomed from the begining. How blind she had been back then.  
  
When the end had come, it was only her position as leader of a technicaly nuteral planet that had saved her from the same fate as Cossack. Lotor had died at the hands of his beloved Allura, his pretty head split open by a rock she had hurled from three feet away. Merla remembered how all that lovely white hair had been stained red with her beloved's blood.  
  
The Queen of the Seventh kingdom was jolted back to the present as the bright pink hair in her hands began to pull away. "Mooooommy! You said you were gonna make my hair jus' like yours!"  
  
Merla smiled, stroking her daughter's hair soothingly. "Sorry, lovey. Mummy got a little lost in thought."  
  
The six year old girl stomped her foot, glaring at her much the way her father had used to glare. "Your always thinkin. You need ta be payin' attention to me!"  
  
"Of course, Lysandra. Of course." Merla murmured as she began to braid her daugher's hair. 


	2. Graveside

"Momma? Why are we here?" Lysandra panted, leaning against something that had once upon a time been a wall, but was now little more than a pile of rubble. She flipped a lock of green streaked hair off of her face, dabbing at some sweat with her sleave.  
  
Merla's lips tightened a moment in annoyance before she let out a sigh. "We're going to visit your father." the queen explained. "I've been meaning to take you to see him for some time... but I think you're finally ready now."  
  
The young princess let out an unladylike snort. "Why should I go? He means nothing to me."  
  
Merla looked at her daughter, feeling a surge of sadness. If she only knew how much like her father she was... "He is your father, Lysandra. And as much as you may deny it... he is, and always will be, a very important part of your life. The Union will never let you forget who he was... nor will the Empire. Do you understand?" She stroked Lysandra's head, tousling the dye streaked hair. "You should get to know some of the good along with the bad." she whispered.  
  
"Ugh. Fine. Whatever." Lysandra threw her hands up in the air and stalked off in the direction they had been walking, her short hair tossed about by a faint breeze that smelt of burned lazon and old death. 


	3. Sins of the Father

_A/N: The sequel nobody thought they'd ever see…_

"It's not _fair_!" Lysandra shrieked, tearing at her hair as she paced across her mother's quarters.

"Life," Merla said sagely, "rarely is."

"You'd think that destroying everything Doom had would be enough to satisfy those bastards." the princess snarled. "But noooo… it doesn't matter to _them_ that people born after the war ended are starving to death in the streets. It doesn't matter to _them_ that thanks to their bombs we can't grow our own crops anymore. It doesn't matter to _them_ that most of the population is too young to work, by their own laws!" She picked up a goblet and threw it across the room. It shattered against the wall, the crystal sparkling like ice as it fell.

Merla watched all this calmly. She knew her daughter would feel better after venting her frustration.

"Why do I have to be punished for something I didn't do?" the girl asked, her voice low and filled with tears she refused to shed.


End file.
